I first became aware of Dale Dobson in the late 1960s when he ripped through heats like hot butter. Not only was his surfing faster than most anyone in the burgeoning pro surf scene of the time, he also stood apart for his creative approach.
It may have been his La Jolla roots that first entangled Dobson with the idea of switching stance (riding equally with right foot or left foot forward). As a young man he had fallen in the shadow of one of Windansea’s all-time great surfers, Butch Van Artsdalen.
Van Artsdalen, who by the mid ’60s had earned the title Mister Pipeline, was a master of switching stance. Surfing switch stance is not as easy as it may appear, but Dobson made it look so simple that I still don’t know if his natural stance is regular foot (left foot forward) or goofyfoot (right foot forward). Like Butch, the Pipeline crown inheritor, Jock Sutherland, and very few others, Dobson’s preference of stance is impossible to ascertain.
By the late ’60s, Dale had become a winning shortboard competitor, taking high or top honors at most any event he entered. He seemed to react to each section appropriately by either bottom turning, hitting the lip, cutting back or getting barreled. It didn’t matter to him if he was on rights on lefts. And there was no herky-jerk excess in his style.
Circa 1967, there was what I call a “baby and bathwater” revolution. Known commonly as the Shortboard Revolution, it swept the surfing world and took boards from 10-foot, double-glassed, 30-pound noseriders, down to sub-7, single-glassed pocket rockets weighing less than 10 pounds. The results — faster turns and deeper tube riding — were predictable enough, but something had been lost in translation.
By the mid ’70s a few elite surfers, including Donald Takayama, Herbie Fletcher, Ben Aipa and Skip Frye, led a longboard renaissance. It didn’t take long until hanging five, drop knee turns and roundhouse cutbacks were back.
I had been involved with the initial surge and was getting the hang of longboarding again when I saw Dobson riding Cardiff Reef. This must have been in the late ’70s-early ’80s, but Dobson had not lost a step. In fact, he seemed to have gained a few of them. He did all the old moves: hanging ten, left to right bottom turns and sweeping cutbacks, along the newly invented helicopter 360, which requires running to the nose and spinning the board in a complete circle.
This was the type of surfing that had Encyclopedia of Surfing founder Matt Warshaw gushing, “Straight up the most gifted pure athlete in the sport.” Equally high praise came from legendary surf journo Drew Kampion, who said: “Dobson’s style is so much his own. He is one of the most unique and creative in the business.”
I don’t have time here to discuss his winning ways as a skateboarder or a kneeboarder (Dobson won the U.S. knee boarding title in 1973). But it is on a surfboard, especially one 9 feet or over that he made his most permanent mark.
Next time you see him, please ask for me if he began surfing as a goofyfoot or a regular foot. On second thought, please don’t. I kind of enjoy the mystery of Dale Dobson.
